I love my kids and my pets please help me!

I see. Im sorry to hear that snakes are complicating things. I really think that you need a lawyer to help you navigate this ordeal.

So CPS removing the kids from the home happened a while ago if you've already been to court.

Why do you not have an attorney yet? Because you needed one yesterday, not only to deal with this issue but also to get custody, support, and visitation orders in place.

And if you need to sell the snakes to pay the attorney then you do it. You can get more snakes later.

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Originally Posted by bcr229

So CPS removing the kids from the home happened a while ago if you've already been to court.

Why do you not have an attorney yet? Because you needed one yesterday, not only to deal with this issue but also to get custody, support, and visitation orders in place.

And if you need to sell the snakes to pay the attorney then you do it. You can get more snakes later.

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Absolutely. Your kids need you a million times more than you need the snakes. Maybe try to relocate them to a friend or family member's house, or just sell altogether if need be. There are always going to be snakes around in the future. This time point is pivotal to establish custody rights, don't let the opportunity slip by. You 100% need an attorney, otherwise you will never get the deal that you want.

You could try to rehome them temporarily with a friend or family member until you get custody back. You could also explain the situation to the nearest reptile rescue; they'll often help out in situations like that.

As long as BPs are legal in your area, any decent attorney should be able to deal with that. There is no documentation of them inflicting any sort of serious injury to a child, and they are sold in almost all chain petstores as starter pets (clearly aimed at children whose parents will take care of the animal).

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Originally Posted by DVirginiana

You could try to rehome them temporarily with a friend or family member until you get custody back. You could also explain the situation to the nearest reptile rescue; they'll often help out in situations like that.

As long as BPs are legal in your area, any decent attorney should be able to deal with that. There is no documentation of them inflicting any sort of serious injury to a child, and they are sold in almost all chain petstores as starter pets (clearly aimed at children whose parents will take care of the animal).

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Totally. Just because an animal is non-traditional, or scary to some, doesn't mean that there is legal precedent to deny access of a child to a home that contains that animal. Dogs kill and injure by far the most children in the US every year.

There is more to this story than just the animals.
If its truthfully this bad, the animals need to be rehomed because I would bet its more the care of the animals than anything?

I'm sorry to hear about your problems but I have to agree with the last few posts that you need to do what is right for your family and get you home and life in order. Pets are replaceable kids are not. I would sell the snakes and the rats and get the racks either dismantled and stored or just sell them too. Then fix what you need to and get your family back. I'm assuming because you posted this plea for help that you're open to suggestions and will see the writing on the wall. My house was robbed on April 9th, while my wife and 2 boys were home, and it traumatized her to the point of not feeling safe in the house, so I listed the house, sold it, moved almost all of our personal belongings into a storage unit and we are currently living in a 2br apartment waiting for our new house to be built. As part of this I had to re-home my 2 viv's with 5 Poison Dart Frogs, found new owners for my Crested Geckos, and found a temporary place for my snakes. All this was done in less than 2 months, in fact the majority of it was done in the first 3 weeks after the robbery.